Endowment Misselling Complaints Deadline

auntieboo

It surprises me that so many people are still fighting the mis-selling of endowment mortgages.
A few years ago the financial pages of the national press hinted at problems, albeit in very small articles. When the articles progressed to a full paragraph, alarm bells started a-jingling in my head!
I had an endowment mortgage from Legal and General, through the Halifax. To cut a long story short, I wrote to L&G highlighting my concerns and after some dithering they offered me compensation based on what I would have paid back on a repayment mortgage....with a little help from a few savings, I paid off my mortgage fully. The compensation was extremely generous and as Halifax had given me a mortgage at 48years old for 20 years...I honestly don't know how on earth I would have paid it back. I was so thrilled at 48yrs to get a badly needed mortgage, I did not think of later payment problems. I thank my lucky stars I read those early articles.

shelagh

We had 2 endowment morgages one from Abbey from about 1986 and one from Northern Rock from about1993, these dates are rough ideas i have the info. elsewhere at present. We had the letters saying that we would not be getting the amounts that we had been told would clear our morgage, and then some, and we kept paying them for a few years. We decided to sell them before we had heard that we could claim compensation for misselling and we traded them in for a couple of grand. We are now most annoyed with ourseelves because of this but we felt that we were just throwing good money after bad by keeping them. My question is can we do anything about this now or are we too late? I have just realised that this thread was last posted on ages ago! again, am I too late?
Thanks Shelagh

EdInvestor

Hi Shelagh

shelagh wrote:

We decided to sell them before we had heard that we could claim compensation for misselling and we traded them in for a couple of grand. We are now most annoyed with ourseelves because of this but we felt that we were just throwing good money after bad by keeping them. My question is can we do anything about this now or are we too late?

Don't be too annoyed: almost certainly you wouldn't now be able to sell them, but would have to take the lower surrender value offered by the insurance company. So you've benefitted there

On claiming for misselling, there is normally a "time bar" of three years after you get a "red letter" stating there is a "high risk" of a shortfall.

However there are various legal efforts underway to test the legality of time bars, so you may not be too late.

https://www.endowmentaction.co.uk is a useful website with info on grounds for complaint.

shelagh

Thanks Ed.,
we feel better about this now and have decided to contact the companies who sold us the endowments and ask for copies of our endowment files which we didn't know we could do. Thanks again.
Shelagh

dunstonh

we feel better about this now and have decided to contact the companies who sold us the endowments and ask for copies of our endowment files which we didn't know we could do.

After the policy is surrendered, you may find that the client file was destroyed.

defender_of_the_weak

Neither Abbey or Northern Rock are currenly applying time bars to their complaints. Also if the policies were surrendered in the last few years they should still have records.

If your Abbey policy was sold before 1988 they will probably try to fob you off and tell you that they did not really give advice at the time of the sale and merely provided products and information, complete bunk. If you get a letter like this ake the cae to the Ombudsman as abbey will probably change their mind and agree to settle

shelagh

Thanks dunstonh and defender of the weak, I am going to contact Abbey and NR today. However when I sold the policies I sold them to a firm who buys them up, not the insurance co. who issued them does this make any difference and have they any claim on the compensation? I suspect not as the compensation is for being missold the policy but I would just like to check this. Once again thanks your help is much appreciated and if I do get any compensation I will buy everyone who replied a drink!!! honest.
Shelagh

maggieS_2

I was sold a Norwich Union endowment by a Woolwich branch manager in 1984 when he advised me to change from a repayment mortgage as it would provide a 'nest egg' for the future. (I didn't realise at the time he meant his future, not mine!!) From time to time I've wondered if I could complain but a few tentative phone calls always resulted in the 'too long ago' response. I did contact a firm who specialise in working for claimants and they said they thought I may have a case but they wanted 50% of any payment!! They were very persistant but I decided not to bother as I wasn't sure how to word the complaint myself but didn't feel like handing over what I thought would be an exorbitant fee to them. Then I saw Martyn's link to https://www.endowmentaction.co.uk and found it really simple to use - they even provide a letter template. I sent it all off, not thinking I had a hope in hell because of the time limit and the fact that the mortgage has now been paid off. I'm pleased to say that with a minimum of fuss I've had my complaint upheld even though they have no records from that date. I've just received my compensation and am absolutely delighted. I really recommend using the website as it simplifies the whole process - and grateful thanks again to Martyn.

samsyerman

"However there are various legal efforts underway to test the legality of time bars, so you may not be too late."

edinvestor

you quoted this in this thread in July.

Do you have any more details on this issue as I have received a letter back from the FOS sayning that Nationwide Building Society have refused to look at my endowment and my case has been rejected because of the time bar limit.

Any information would be very useful.


samsyerman

EdInvestor

Hi Samsyerman

No advance that I've seen yet.

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